Recent improvements in telecommunications and the electronic industry, and, in particular, advances in digital compression techniques, have led to increased availability of digital content to a consumer. For example, such advances have provided music, movies, videos-on-demand, and interactive television (iTV) to consumers by employing a compressor/decompressor (CODEC) to compress the digital audio and video content, and then to decompress the transmitted compressed content at a consumer's receiver.
With the increased availability of digital content over a network, however, content owners and providers have seen an increase in intellectual property theft. Such theft may arise at any place that the content is exposed. Exposure may arise virtually anywhere along a market stream between the content owner, provider, and the consumer, and even at the consumer's location. Without appropriate protection, the content can be illicitly intercepted, stolen, copied, and redistributed, thus depriving content owners and providers of their profits.
In fact, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) estimates that the industry loses billions of dollars to movie piracy each year. The music industry has also seen major dollar loses due to such activates as hacking, spoofing, and file sharing. Therefore, it is with respect to these considerations and others that the present invention has been made.